Issues of concern to people who live in the west: property rights, water rights, endangered species, livestock grazing, energy production, wilderness and western agriculture. Plus a few items on western history, western literature and the sport of rodeo... Frank DuBois served as the NM Secretary of Agriculture from 1988 to 2003. DuBois is a former legislative assistant to a U.S. Senator, a Deputy Assistant Secretary of Interior, and is the founder of the DuBois Rodeo Scholarship.

Monday, June 27, 2016

Oregon refuge takeover is over, but aftershocks remain

Winter and spring have passed since an armed occupation of a federal wildlife refugeended,
but its aftershocks are still shaking this high desert region of
Oregon, with activists setting up “Camp Freedom” where an occupier was
killed and organizing a recall election this week against a top county
official. The headquarters of the 188,000-acre Malheur National Wildlife Refuge, which was occupied for 41 days,
is still closed. Down the road, at The Narrows cafe, saloon, shop and
gas station, things have settled. Co-owner Linda Gainer said the
business she got from journalists, agents, occupiers, protesters against
the occupation, and from protesters protesting the protesters, more
than made up for any slower days now. The last militants surrendered Feb. 11. “I met some awesome people. And you know, everybody that came through,
they were all polite,” she said, describing how even militia members and
anti-occupation protesters exchanged greetings. Those divisions are evident in the signs about Tuesday’s special recall
election against County Judge Steve Grasty, who for the past 18 years
has been the county’s top administrative official. Grasty blocked
occupation leader Ammon Bundy from holding a public meeting in a county
building, an act cited as justification for the recall effort. Grasty
says it was absurd for Bundy, who said he wanted to turn the federal
refuge over to local residents, to ask to use county property...more